In yesterday’s posting, we quoted from Archbishop Michael A.
Corrigan’s 1886 pastoral that, in part, addressed certain issues raised by
agrarian socialist Henry George during his bid for mayor of New York City that
year. Corrigan first laid out the basis
of the Catholic Church’s position — what we saw yesterday — and then proceeded
to explain how these applied to private property . . . which is today’s
posting:
Starting
from these premises, which no sane man can deny, we invite you to consider in
their light the principles about the rights of property against which we deem
it our solemn duty to give you some words of warning.
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| "All men are created equal" |
First of
all, you must understand in its true sense the statement that “all men are born
equal.” It does not mean that one man may ever surpass others in power of mind,
or strength of body, or beauty of form; since it is a well-established fact
that no two men are exactly alike in all respects. All men are, indeed, equal
in that they are all destined to the same ultimate end, have the same essence,
endowed with the same faculties wherewith to attain that end. Each one has the
faculties of sensation and understanding, for the purpose of animal and
intellectual life. Each one has the grand endowment of free-will, with the
power to raise both animal and intellectual life to the dignity of the moral
order, by directing the whole being and his deeds toward his supreme end —
which is God. This power and freedom in directing his actions towards their
last end are the essential rights of
man.
Now,
just as by training, a man may bring the faculties of sense and understanding
to higher stages of excellence, whilst in essence they remain the same, so,
too, may a man, by care and industry, bring his moral faculties to a wider
range and fuller development of power and activity, without their ceasing to be
his rights. For right may be defined as “the moral faculty which each one has
for what is his or what is due him.” And beyond all doubt every man has a
perfect right to all the means necessary for him to reach his last end.
Besides, as everything else in the world has for its end to subserve the uses
of man, he is in consequence entitled to their use in pursuing his destiny.
Wherefore, to prove that man has a right to any particular object in God’s
universe, we need only prove that such object is necessary to him in relation
to his last end, or even useful provided the rights of others are respected.
This truth once established, the rest of mankind must acknowledge that right,
and are bound in conscience to pay it the duty of respect. Hence, although it
is hotly debated nowadays whether or not a man can have the right of property
or ownership in land, you must not be led by abuses however flagrant, or by
theories however specious, to run the risk of embracing falsehood for truth.
Aim, first of all, at having a clear idea of what is meant by the right of
property. It is, the, the moral faculty of claiming an object as one’s own, and
of disposing both of the object and its utility according to one’s will without
any rightful interference on the part of others. It is universally admitted
that man has the right to the use of certain things, but that any man may
acquire the right to possess a thing as his own, to the exclusion of others, is
sometimes vehemently denied. And among the plausible reasons brought forward in
support of this denial is the allegation that, all being equal, no man has a
right to exclude others who have rights as strong as his; not from the free air
of Heaven, not from the clear light of day, not (they add) from the earth and
its farm lands.
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| "God made the earth for the use of all mankind." |
Undoubtedly
God made the earth for the use of all mankind; but whether the possession
thereof was to be in common, or by individual ownership, was left for reason to
determine. Such determination, judging from the facts of history, the sanction
of law, from the teaching of the wisest and the actions of the best and bravest
of mankind, has been, and is, that man can, by lawful acts, become possessed of
the right of ownership in property, and not merely in its use. The reason is
because a man is strictly entitled to that of which he is the producing cause,
to the improvement he brings about in it, and the enjoyment of both. But it is
clear that in a farm, for instance, which one has, by patient toil, improved in
value; in a block of marble out of which one has chiseled a perfect statue, he
cannot fully enjoy the improvement he has caused unless he have also the right
to own the object thus improved. He has a strict right — and evil are the laws
and systems which ignore it — either to ownership and enjoyment or to a full
compensation for the improvement which is his. To strive to base an argument
against ownership in land by reasoning on the universal distribution of air and
light is only a freak of the imagination. Human industry cannot scatter a cloud
from before the face of the sun, nor lift a fog that may be freighted with damaging
vapors; we take the air and the light as God gives them, and we owe Him thanks
for His bounty. It was only the earth which fell under the primal curse when
man sinned, and only the earth, not the air or light which man’s industrial
toil can coax back to something like its original fruitfulness. When he has
done so, his just reward is to enjoy the results without hindrance from others.
Even in such a necessary, abundant, and free commodity as water, if a man, by
artificial means, congeals a portion of it into ice, is he not entitled to
enjoy its exclusive ownership? Can he not demand for it with justice a
compensation equivalent to his industry? Once deny the right of ownership and
you sow the seed of stagnation in human enterprise. Who would burrow the earth
to draw forth its buried treasures, if the very mine he was working were at the
mercy of the passer-by whom its riches might attract? Who would watch with
eagerness the season when to sow and to reap, and to gather the harvest which
is the very fruit of his labors, if he is told that those who stand by the
wayside idle are equally entitled to its enjoyment? True, indeed, in many
painful instances the rights of the toiler are trampled on, and fruits of his
labor snatched from his grasp. True, this is done too frequently with
concurrence, or at least the connivance, of law. This is the evil that needs
redress, but such redress can never be brought about by denying a fundamental
right or by perpetrating a radical wrong. Seek rather for redress of such
irksome grievances by the wise methods which the Church of Christ is forever
teaching, though her voice may pass unheeded by the great ones of the earth.
We’ll continue with the relevant portions of Corrigan’s
pastoral on Monday. Tomorrow, of course,
we have our weekly news items.
